Bethlehem does not have enough firefighters to adequately protect the city and its residents from fire dangers, according to a study backed by the city\u2019s fire union.<\/p>\n
The study was conducted by the International Association of Fire Fighters\u2019 GIS department, which used city data from 2021 through 2024. The study was commissioned and paid for by\u00a0IAFF Local 735, which represents Bethlehem\u2019s firefighters.\u00a0IAFF Local 735\u00a0President\u00a0Lou Jimenez\u00a0presented the findings at a public safety committee meeting at\u00a0City Hall\u00a0on Wednesday afternoon, the day before Mayor\u00a0J. William Reynolds\u00a0presented plans for the city\u2019s 2026 budget, which did not propose adding firefighter jobs.<\/p>\n
Jimenez said the fire union has a good relationship with city leadership and did not intentionally schedule the presentation right ahead of the budget \u2014 rather, the union wanted to present the study\u2019s findings as quickly as possible, and the report was finalized last week.<\/p>\n
According to the study\u2019s findings, the city\u2019s level of staffing is below levels recommended by the\u00a0National Fire Protection Association. The department is budgeted for 104 personnel, below the levels of staffing in 1976, according to Jimenez.<\/p>\n
The city staffs 18 firefighters citywide per shift, below the 30 recommended by the NFPA. Further, Bethlehem\u2019s minimum staffing level for one engine is two firefighters and one officer, below the NFPA\u2019s recommendation of at least three firefighters and one officer on one engine.<\/p>\n
City firefighters also are responding to high-priority incidents within four minutes 80% of the time, below the 90% benchmark set by the NFPA, the report states. The lower level of staffing is a concern because \u201cseconds matter\u201d when it comes to saving lives during a fire response, Jimenez and other fire union advocates said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe more people we have on hand, the better we can combat emergencies,\u201d Jimenez said.<\/p>\n
He said he wanted the city to avoid tragedies like the 2025\u00a0Fall River<\/a>\u00a0assisted living fire, where a blaze at a\u00a0Massachusetts\u00a0nursing home killed 10 residents and injured 30 people, including firefighters.<\/p>\n The Bethlehem Fire Department\u00a0received widespread accolades for its response to a\u00a0five-alarm fire at Five 10 Flats<\/a>\u00a0in May, which gutted the apartment building but caused no deaths or injuries. Jimenez credited people spotting and quickly calling in the fire on the building\u2019s roof, which allowed fire personnel to respond in time to prevent tragedy, but added that \u201chad it been\u00a02 a.m.\u00a0in the morning, it could have been a totally different outcome.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe do not need an emergency like that in this city. I don\u2019t want to see any of us hurt or die because we don\u2019t have enough people,\u201d Jimenez said.<\/p>\n The study also calls for the city to open another fire station, near Linden and East Goepp streets, to better serve the northeast region of the city.<\/p>\n Reynolds said Thursday the union had not yet shared a copy of the study with his office. The city already has issued a request for proposals from firms to conduct a study on the fire department\u2019s efficiency, Reynolds said, which will also evaluate the department\u2019s staffing levels.\u00a0Bethlehem\u00a0last year began hiring recruits from the\u00a0Allentown Fire Academy, which trains prospective firefighters twice a year instead of once a year, allowing it to more quickly fill vacancies.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a92025 The Morning Call. Visit\u00a0mcall.com<\/a>. Distributed by\u00a0Tribune Content Agency, LLC.<\/a><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bethlehem does not have enough firefighters to adequately protect the city and its residents from fire dangers, according…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20921,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[153,155,154],"class_list":["post-20920","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem-headlines","tag-bethlehem-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20920","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20920"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20920\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20921"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20920"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20920"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20920"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}